Fast pyrolysis of tropical biomass species and influence of water pretreatment on product distributions

Journal Article · Tue Mar 15 00:00:00 EDT 2016 · PLoS ONE

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0151368· OSTI ID:1323898

Morgan, Trevor James ^[1]; Turn, Scott Q. ^[1]; Sun, Ning ^[2]; George, Anthe ^[3]; Gupta, Vijai ^[4]

---

1. Univ. of Hawaii, Honolulu, HI (United States)
2. Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States)
3. Sandia National Lab. (SNL-CA), Livermore, CA (United States)
4. National Univ. of Ireland, Galway (Ireland)

Here, the fast pyrolysis behaviour of pretreated banagrass was examined at four temperatures (between 400 and 600 C) and four residence times (between ~1.2 and 12 s). The pretreatment used water washing/leaching to reduce the inorganic content of the banagrass. Yields of bio-oil, permanent gases and char were determined at each reaction condition and compared to previously published results from untreated banagrass. Comparing the bio-oil yields from the untreated and pretreated banagrass shows that the yields were greater from the pretreated banagrass by 4 to 11 wt% (absolute) at all reaction conditions. The effect of pretreatment (i.e. reducing the amount of ash, and alkali and alkali earth metals) on pyrolysis products is: 1) to increase the dry bio-oil yield, 2) to decrease the amount of undetected material, 3) to produce a slight increase in CO yield or no change, 4) to slightly decrease CO₂ yield or no change, and 5) to produce a more stable bio-oil (less aging). Char yield and total gas yield were unaffected by feedstock pretreatment. Four other tropical biomass species were also pyrolyzed under one condition (450°C and 1.4 s residence time) for comparison to the banagrass results. The samples include two hardwoods: leucaena and eucalyptus, and two grasses: sugarcane bagasse and energy-cane. A sample of pretreated energy-cane was also pyrolyzed. Of the materials tested, the best feedstocks for fast pyrolysis were sugarcane bagasse, pretreated energy cane and eucalyptus based on the yields of 'dry bio-oil', CO and CO₂. On the same basis, the least productive feedstocks are untreated banagrass followed by pretreated banagrass and leucaena.

• Research Organization: Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States); Sandia National Laboratories (SNL-NM), Albuquerque, NM (United States)
• Sponsoring Organization: USDOE; USDOE Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE)
• Grant/Contract Number: AC02-05CH11231; AC04-94AL85000
• OSTI ID: 1323898
• Alternate ID(s): OSTI ID: 1379115
• Report Number(s): SAND2016-8567J; 647074
• Journal Information: PLoS ONE, Journal Name: PLoS ONE Journal Issue: 3 Vol. 11; ISSN 1932-6203
• Publisher: Public Library of Science
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

09 BIOMASS FUELS